Swan Song
by John Bigboote
Summary: Watch as Jun pulls off one of her greatest japes.


Split up, they said. We'll cover more of the base if we all take separate routes, they said. Jun wanted to strangle the rest of the doofuses on her team and she wasn't even evil yet.

If anything positive could be said about her current situation, it's at least she was rather popular with the ten-ton unmanned sentries of the Galactor federation. A mob of the towering robots were crammed around her in the narrow tunnel. A bizarre shell-like contraption made from segmented layers of armor kept her paralyzed on the floor.

Jun was on her back with the machine spread on top of her like a segmented metal blanket. It covered everything from her chest down to her thighs. Her gloved arms were trapped under the giant shell only her shoulders could still move. Her white boots stuck out of the bottom of the structure with her knees bent upward and her ankles resting an inch off the floor on the machine's frame. She rapidly gasped to catch her breath as small puffs of steam wafted around her.

The robotic squadron had been called in by Berg Katze, Galactor's second-in-command. Her dark mask hid her eyes, but the expressions she made with her lips always showed exactly what she was thinking. She was holding a small wireless transmitter in her palm that she used to administer Jun's fate.

Wires fed out of the rattling diesel motors of every robot crowded in the hall and were attached to the machine covering Jun. The jerry-rigged system supplied extra power to the shell-like contraption, and the contraption in turn unleashed its energy in numbing electrical shocks that swarmed over Jun's body. What the Galactor fiends were trying to do took an exuberant amount of resources, but they would get their very own Science Ninja if it worked. Or they'd just end up killing her.

Jun shrieked again as the third burst of lightning within the past minute sparked through her paralyzed body. The halls violently flickered like a madman's laboratory as the robots poured their electricity into the structure caging Jun. Each time she squealed or winced, her head wrenched back in pain and her legs throbbed in a nervous reflex. Even the boosted strength and defenses she gained from being in her Gatchaman form did little to negate her misery.

The ceiling of the narrow corridor was lined with an alert system that flashed notifications across a digital marquee. The endless scrolling screens on both sides of the hall current only showed one message on repeat.

_ROOKERY 94 OFF LIMITS – CLOACALIBRATION IN PROGRESS . . ._

Jun had figured she was just making her way through one of Galactor's robotics mills once her team split off in separate directions. She was never expecting to turn a corner and suddenly come face to face with 20% of organization's total mechanized forces in a hallway no more than 30 feet wide. She had no idea what she had stumbled into, but it must have been important to be this heavily defended.

The fight between Jun's lone self and Katze's dozens of robots (in the short time it lasted) had been overwhelming chaos. One second Jun was balancing on her palms halfway into a front flip. In the next second, one of the robots came smashing over her and flattened her against the floor while her legs were still up. The shell that now covered most of her body had unfolded on top of her before she even knew she was pinned. A matching set of three black bands etched with a tiny identification number had found their way around her ankles and neck on top of her costume almost the moment she was down.

"I hope you're enjoying the electrotherapy, my dear," Katze chuckled. "We call this the Eggcessive Machine."

"Do whatever you want! You're wasting your time trying to make me give up! I'm going to make you pay when I get out of this thing!" Jun stubbornly shouted from the ground. She winced from another shock as soon as she finished talking.

"Sweet Swan. When we're through with you, the only one who will be paying anything is you paying your loyalty to Galactor," Katze sneered back in amusement.

She glided her fingers across her wireless transmitter, increasing and decreasing the electronic fluctuations sweeping through Jun to put her body in more of a receiving mood. The fallen Science Ninja shrieked and yelped with each minor tweak.

The black shell encased almost all of Jun's vital features, but what was secretly happening underneath all of the complex hardware was another story. Sensors inside of the machine recorded the entire scene candidly and sent the video images to a small screen on Katze's pad. The front flap of Jun's spandex skirt was pushed over one of her hips to reveal the narrow portion of her leotard that traveled between her legs. The seam that normally hugged her right thigh was pulled all the way to the left by a set of crafty levers and wires.

Katze changed the filter on her device so she was now looking at a sonographic outline of Jun's body. Specific pressure points were highlighted along her figure to show the electrons being distributed through her organs and muscles. The display scanned down the hourglass outline and focused on the hollow area detected between Jun's hips.

"Gyuh!" Jun abruptly gasped at the same moment Katze tapped a button on her screen. A solid oval shape launched out of the internal components of the machine locked on top of Jun and traveled up into the occupiable zone highlighted on Katze's viewer. Curving and intersecting lines representing nerve clusters and organ boundaries convulsed as they resisted the presence of the strange metal object that didn't belong there. The resistance quickly spread through the rest of Jun's figure, causing her to shudder and groan.

The object on the screen "hatched," for lack of a better term. Once it had been transferred from a mechanical vessel to a biological one, it lost its perfectly oval shape and uncurled into a longer winding form. It coiled through the space confined within the lower portion of the female silhouette using millions of tiny limbs as it emitted intense electronic waves. The transmission started inside of Jun's waist and reached in every direction through the rest of her anatomy. Katze smiled ominously while she watched the little tool complete its task.

Jun screamed as she writhed under the giant shell. Tiny lightning sparks crackled over the visible parts of her head, shoulders, and legs. Her Swan costume turned bright pink as the currents shorted out her transforming powers. When the energy faded, all that remained was Jun's body soaked in sweat and lacking any type of clothing. Her transformation bracelet and the black collar and ankle bands were the only things still on her.

Jun gasped for breath like she had been diving underwater for too long. Her eyes stared in a dizzy blur at the ceiling. Her toes curled and contorted over each other as her bare feet spasmed. Her brown hair clumped underneath her head and neck in a tangled mess.

"Hmm. So the Science Ninja Team's graceful swan is a brunette," Katze purred through her lips. "Funny. For some reason I always thought you'd have green hair."

She brushed her index finger across her handheld display, raising the intensity of the voltage and the intensity of Jun's tormented screams.

* * *

Jun sluggishly stumbled down the empty factory hallway bathed in dark red light. Her right shoulder was constantly leaning against the wall as she struggled to keep her balance. She was bare naked except for her transformation watch and the black identification bands locked around her ankles and neck. When read closely with clear lighting, the number she wore was H378R94. The "H" stood for "Hen" and the "R" stood for "Rookery."

Her mind was so scattered she couldn't remember if she'd fought off Katze's mob of robots or she'd been let go. She was alone in a narrow tunnel that seemed to stretch for miles. The pixelated marquees high above her head were looping through phrases she couldn't read in her feverish lightheaded daze.

_THREAT LEVEL 0 – NESTING SUCCESS – THREAT LEVEL 0 – NESTING SUCCESS_

She winced sharply as she suddenly collapsed to her knees with her arms tightly cradling her waist. She groaned in discomfort as whatever diabolical _thing _Katze had put inside of her strengthened its influence over her. She was becoming like a robot herself with a tiny squirming pilot using its millions of arms to control her from her belly.

Jun slowly lifted her head when her pain subsided. Her mouth curled into a wicked smile as her eyes became bright and deranged. She laughed softly under her breath.

* * *

The five members of the Gatchaman force were taking the day off at Ryu's beach house after returning from their attack on Galactor's headquarters. Ken was leaning over a table as he scratched his temple thinking about the team's next move. Joe was taking a long drag from a cigarette. Jun was stretched out on the sofa with her legs crossed on the armrest. Jinpei was huddled near the TV intensely focused on the Sega Saturn game he was playing. Ryu was sitting beside him with several bowls of snacks laid out on the floor.

Jun sighed quietly as she stretched her arms above her head.

"Hey Ryu, can you pass me some more of those gummy worms? I'm starving."

"Sure, Jun!" Ryu said as he gladly reached for one of the bowls. "Anything for a lady!"

The sudden twang of a proton beam resonated through the room. Ryu dropped motionless to the floor with his eyeballs bulging and a gaping hole burnt through his forehead. Everyone stopped what they were doing and turned toward the sofa in horror.

Jun was holding a pink and white blaster with wisps of smoke rising from its barrel. She had managed to keep it cleverly hidden somewhere in her jeans and faded swim meet t-shirt. The mermaid had gone murderous.

She tilted her head coyly as she triggered her Gatchaman transformation. The black bands on her ankles and neck were visible only in the brief couple of seconds she appeared in the nude as she transformed from one outfit to another. They were permanent fixtures on her body that she preferred to keep invisible. It helped hide her true status as one of Galactor's prized pets.

She was still relaxing on the sofa once she was in her shining battle dress, but a small hop over the armrest put her on her feet. She brushed her white gossamer cape down her shoulders as she straightened her posture.

Her eyes gleamed deviously under the clear beak-shaped visor on her helmet. She was shorter than Ken and Joe and only slightly taller than Jinpei, but she exuded the most power out of all of them after catching them off guard.

Her blaster dematerialized into ribbons of neon energy as she lowered it to the exposed side of her hip. Her costume was essentially designed like a long-sleeved swimsuit covered with a medium-length cape and feather-shaped flaps hanging down the front and back of her waist to form a sleek miniskirt. It kept her legs free when she was knocking enemies senseless with judo kicks and soaring through the sky on her hovercycle.

When she lifted her hand again, she was twirling her signature yo-yo around her gloved index finger. She craned her wrist so the yo-yo extended on its metal wire and circled above her arm like a 5-foot-wide spinning blade looking to claim some heads.

"Anyone want to play 'Walk the Dog'?" Jun asked with a menacing grin.

* * *

_Author's note: I took a break from messing around with Yasuomi Umetsu's reinterpretation of Luna so I could mess around with Yasuomi Umetsu's reinterpretation of Jun._


End file.
